ABSTRACTPrior experiments indicated that reading literary fiction improves mentalising performance relative to reading popular fiction, non-fiction, or not reading. However, the experiments had relatively small sample sizes and hence low statistical power. To address this limitation, the present authors conducted four high-powered replication experiments testing the causal impact of reading literary fiction on mentalising. Relative to the original research, the present experiments used the same literary texts in the reading manipulation; the same mentalising task; and the same kind of participant (...) samples. Moreover, one experiment was pre-registered as a direct replication. In none of the experiments did reading literary fiction have any effect on mentalising relative to control conditions. The results replicate earlier findings that familiarity with fiction is positively correlated with mentalising. Taken together, the present findings call into question whether a single session of rea... (shrink)

This paper examines the outcomes of Preserving the Past Together, a workshop series designed to build the capacity of local heritage managers to engage in collaborative and community-based approaches to archaeology and historic preservation. Over the past two decades practitioners of these approaches have demonstrated the interpretive, methodological, and ethical value of integrating Indigenous perspectives and methods into the process and practice of heritage management and archaeology. Despite these benefits, few professional resources exist to support the development of collaborative relationships (...) between local heritage managers and Tribal nations. Filling this need, Preserving the Past Together’s interactive workshops and keynote lectures involved participants in a discussion of the central themes in collaborative and Indigenous approaches to archaeology today, highlighting the local challenges and opportunities that exist for archaeologists, heritage managers, and Tribal nations to work together to care for the past. This paper presents an overview of the event series’ goals, the strategies it used to foster collaboration among the diverse stakeholders of the Salish Sea, and the next steps the project’s co-directors are taking to further support communication and collaboration between stewards and stakeholders in the Pacific Northwest. (shrink)

We introduce a constructive model of selective belief revision in which it is possible to accept only a part of the input information. A selective revision operator ο is defined by the equality K ο α = K * f(α), where * is an AGM revision operator and f a function, typically with the property ⊢ α → f(α). Axiomatic characterizations are provided for three variants of selective revision.

The present research examines how narrative engagement, or the extent to which people immerse themselves into the world of a story, varies as a function of narrative perspective and individual differences in alexithymia. The authors hypothesised that narrative engagement would be higher when people assume a first-person (rather than third-person) perspective and for people lower (rather than higher) on alexithymia. In an online study (N = 541) and a lab study (N = 55), participants with varying levels of alexithymia read (...) first- and/or third-person narrated texts and then rated their narrative engagement. As expected, first-person stories evoked more narrative engagement than third-person stories, and global alexithymia was negatively correlated with narrative engagement. Narrative perspective did not interact with cognitive facets of alexithymia (i.e. difficulties identifying, verbalising, and understanding feelings). However, narrative perspective did interact with affective facets of alexithymia (i.e. emotionalising and fantasising): First-person (rather than third-person) stories elicited more narrative engagement at lower levels of affective alexithymia, but not at higher levels of affective alexithymia. The interaction effect was significant in Study 1; the interaction was significant in Study 2 after controlling for trait absorption. Together, these findings suggest that alexithymia is linked to difficulties in mentally simulating narrative worlds. (shrink)

The present research examines how narrative engagement, or the extent to which people immerse themselves into the world of a story, varies as a function of narrative perspective and individual differences in alexithymia. The authors hypothesised that narrative engagement would be higher when people assume a first-person (rather than third-person) perspective and for people lower (rather than higher) on alexithymia. In an online study (N = 541) and a lab study (N = 55), participants with varying levels of alexithymia read (...) first- and/or third-person narrated texts and then rated their narrative engagement. As expected, first-person stories evoked more narrative engagement than third-person stories, and global alexithymia was negatively correlated with narrative engagement. Narrative perspective did not interact with cognitive facets of alexithymia (i.e. difficulties identifying, verbalising, and understanding feelings). However, narrative perspective did interact with affective facets of alexithymia (i.e. emotionalising and fantasising): First-person (rather than third-person) stories elicited more narrative engagement at lower levels of affective alexithymia, but not at higher levels of affective alexithymia. The interaction effect was significant in Study 1; the interaction was significant in Study 2 after controlling for trait absorption. Together, these findings suggest that alexithymia is linked to difficulties in mentally simulating narrative worlds. (shrink)

This book is a collection of secondary essays on America's most important philosophic thinkers—statesmen, judges, writers, educators, and activists—from the colonial period to the present. Each essay is a comprehensive introduction to the thought of a noted American on the fundamental meaning of the American regime.

ABSTRACT During the current COVID-19 pandemic, we are experiencing physical viruses infecting our bodies, virtual viruses infecting our computers, and symbolic viruses infecting our thinking. This essay takes up each of these interruptions in a collective attempt to better understand how we are rhetorically and where we might go politically from here.

Metagenomics bears upon all aspects of microbiology, including our understanding of mitochondrial and eukaryote origin. Recently, ribosomal protein phylogenies show the eukaryote host lineage – the archaeal lineage that acquired the mitochondrion – to branch within the archaea. Metagenomic studies are now uncovering new archaeal lineages that branch more closely to the host than any cultivated archaea do. But how do they grow? Carbon and energy metabolism as pieced together from metagenome assemblies of these new archaeal lineages, such as the (...) Deep Sea Archaeal Group (including Lokiarchaeota) and Bathyarchaeota, do not match the physiology of any cultivated microbes. Understanding how these new lineages live in their environment is important, and might hold clues about how mitochondria arose and how the eukaryotic lineage got started. Here we look at these exciting new metagenomic studies, what they say about archaeal physiology in modern environments, how they impact views on host‐mitochondrion physiological interactions at eukaryote origin. (shrink)

In biological electron transport the spin, and thus the magnetic property of electrons, is neglected. Furthermore, no attention is paid to the fact that the great majority of biologically important molecules are chiral, and during excitation a magnetic moment is induced in them. It is shown, both theoretically and experimentally, that the magnetic moment of the electron and the magnetic transition moment of the optically active molecules may interact. The main consequences of such an interaction are a higher probability of (...) the occurrence of optically active molecules in triplet states, and the polarization of transported electrons. (shrink)

Here is the liar paradox. We have a sentence, (L), which somehow says of itself that it is false. Suppose (L) is true. Then things are as (L) says they are. (For it would appear to be a mere platitude that if a sentence is true, then things are as the sentence says they are.) (L) says that (L) is false. So, (L) is false. Since the supposition that (L) is true leads to contradiction, we can assert that (L) is (...) false. But since this is just what (L) says, (L) is then true. (For it would appear to be a mere platitude that if things are as a given sentence says they are, the sentence is true.) So (L) is true. So (L) is both true and false. Contradiction. (shrink)

La distinction entre la distinctio rationis ratiocinatae et la distinctio rationis ratiocinantis n’est aucunement une spécialité scotiste, mais bien un héritage scolastique commun depuis le XVIe. La controverse portait sur la manière dont la distinctio rationis ratiocinantis s’appliquait à la proposition « A=A ». Sur ce point, la pensée de Mastri constitue un tournant dans l’histoire du scotisme, dans la mesure où il n’instrumentalise plus la distinctio rationis ratiocinantis pour la logique mentaliste, mais au contraire la transforme en une doctrine (...) ontologique qui permet au conceptualisme d’Auriol de se faire une place au sein du scotisme.In the scholastic way of spelling out « A=A », some sort of distinction intervened between the relata, viz. the distinctio rationis ratiocinantis. To distinguish between the distinctio rationis ratiocinatae and ratiocinantis was commonplace from the sixteenth up to the eighteenth centuries. But how to make sense of a distinction that is without any foundation in the object itself ? Mastri’s account marks a crisis within Scotism, since his reception of Peter Aureol’s conceptualism made it possible to give the distinctio rationis ratiocinantis a metaphysical rather than a logical interpretation. (shrink)

Dans le débat sur la nature du national-socialisme entre « fracture de la civilisation » et expression de « l’ambiguïté essentielle de la modernité », cet article étudie la radicalisation progressive du discours sur les « asociaux » dans les dernières années de Weimar et examine si l’on y trouve déjà la préparation idéologique et pratique de la politique d’extermination des nazis (euthanasie, stérilisation forcée, « mort par le travail »). Le biologisme, l’économisme, la criminologie et l’eugénisme ou « hygiène (...) raciale » apparaissent comme les racines du discours sur les asociaux sous Weimar. On voit que des auteurs parlaient déjà, dans les années vingt, d’« éliminer les vies ne méritant pas d’être vécues » et préconisaient la stérilisation, l’avortement et l’euthanasie dans certains cas. S’appuyant sur l’exemple de mesures pratiques et de discussions sur l’internement d’« asociaux », l’auteur montre que les idées eugénistes étaient répandues non seulement chez les hommes politiques de droite, mais aussi largement à gauche. L’évolution de l’État social sous Weimar, de ses débuts prometteurs jusqu’à la crise de sa fin, est d’abord rapidement esquissée ; puis l’auteur étudie en détail la montée de l’agressivité dans les années de crise, où l’on voit les cercles chargés de l’assistance prendre de moins en moins l’individu et de plus en plus la Volksgemeinschaft comme référence de leur action. Avec une fréquence croissante est avancée l’idée de réserver les prestations sociales à ceux qui les « mériteraient » et que la société n’aurait plus d’argent pour entretenir des « poids morts ». Ainsi cette étude montre-t-elle que la question de la continuité entre Weimar et le nazisme ne peut, dans ce domaine, être globalement affirmée ou infirmée et qu’au contraire seule l’étude attentive des projets de loi, des institutions et des biographies permet d’identifier des continuités. (shrink)

Hilpelä, J. Methodology and dialectics.--Juntunen, M. Dialectics and two levels of rationality.--Mehtonen, L. A note on the "two" definitions of dialectics in Anti-Dühring.

Elementær filologisk-litterær hermeneutik. En historisk skitse er et lærdomshistorisk og litteraturvidenskabeligt essay, som følger udvalgte traditionsstrenge fra det gamle Athen over de hermeneutiske klassikere Schleiermacher og Gadamer til de seneste års postmodernisme og dekonstruktion. Formålet er at vise, at den hermeneutiske tradition ikke kun rummer indsigter af blivende værdi for alle humanistiske videnskaber, hvor læsning og tolkning står centralt, men også i sin mangfoldighed rejser spørgsmål, som på ingen måde er uddebatterede.

Après un examen des emplois antérieurs du terme « pseudotechnologie », une définition est proposée : « Une pseudotechnologie est une technologie présumée, irrémédiablement dysfonctionnelle pour l’usage auquel elle est destinée, puisqu’elle est basée sur des principes de construction qui ne peuvent pas être mis en œuvre ». La relation entre la pseudotechnologie et la pseudoscience est examinée, tout comme la relation entre la pseudotechnologie et le concept beaucoup plus faible de malfonction technologique. Une explication est proposée de la raison (...) pour laquelle la pseudotechnologie est beaucoup plus rarement mentionnée que la pseudoscience : le dysfonctionnement d’une technologie se manifeste généralement au moment de son utilisation, tandis que le dysfonctionnement d’une science est généralement plus difficile à établir. (shrink)

Sven Erik Nordenbo; Bildung and the Thinking of Bildung, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 36, Issue 3, 16 December 2002, Pages 341–352, https://doi.or.

Carnap’s seminal ‘Empiricism, Semantics and Ontology’ makes important use of the notion of a framework and the related distinction between internal and external questions. But what exactly is a framework? And what role does the internal/external distinction play in Carnap’s metaontology? In an influential series of papers, Matti Eklund has recently defended a bracingly straightforward interpretation: A Carnapian framework, Eklund says, is just a natural language. To ask an internal question, then, is just to ask a question in, say, English. (...) To try to ask an external question is to try, absurdly, to ask a question in no language at all. Finding that so trivial an I/e distinction can’t help to explain Carnap’s deflationary metaontology, Eklund is led to attribute to Carnap a view he calls ontological pluralism. In this paper, I show that Eklund misreads Carnap, and I argue that this misreading obscures fundamental features of Carnap’s philosophy. I then defend an account of frameworks as what Carnap called semantical systems, and I place this account in the context of Carnap’s philosophical program of explication. Finally, I discuss the role that frameworks and the I/e distinction play in ESO, showing that ESO provides no reason to attribute the doctrine of ontological pluralism to Carnap. (shrink)

Aus dem Inhalt: Die Wissenschaftslehre als System der unvollendeten Vollendung (Sven Juergensen). - Fichtes Wechselwirkung und der implizite Hoerer der Wissenschaftslehre nova methodo (Guenther Zoeller). - Die Begrenzung: vom Anstoss zur Aufforderung (Jacinto Rivera de Rosales). - Die Idee des Leibes im Jenaer System (Virginia Lopez-Dominguez). - Fichtes politische und Rechtsphilosophie in der Deutung Richard Schottkys (Carla de Pascale). - Gibt es bei Fichte eine transzendentale Anthropologie? (Jose L. Villacanas).

How do we ascribe subjective probability? In decision theory, this question is often addressed by representation theorems, going back to Ramsey (1926), which tell us how to define or measure subjective probability by observable preferences. However, standard representation theorems make strong rationality assumptions, in particular expected utility maximization. How do we ascribe subjective probability to agents which do not satisfy these strong rationality assumptions? I present a representation theorem with weak rationality assumptions which can be used to define or measure (...) subjective probability for partly irrational agents. (shrink)

In his recent article "Carnapian Frameworks" (Synthese, 2021), Gabriel Broughton criticizes my discussions of Carnap on ontology and puts forward his own interpretation of what Carnap’s external/internal distinction amounts to. I here first argue that Broughton’s main claims about me are based on a misinterpretation. Then I turn to some issues of broader interest. I argue that Broughton’s own, potentially interesting interpretation of Carnap’s external/internal distinction does not work. And in light of Broughton’s discussion I present a sharpened version of (...) what I have earlier said about Carnap’s this distinction. (shrink)

Antinatalism is an emerging philosophy and practice that challenges pronatalism, the prevailing philosophy and practice in reproductive matters. We explore justifications of antinatalism—the arguments from the quality of life, the risk of an intolerable life, the lack of consent, and the asymmetry of good and bad—and argue that none of them supports a concrete, understandable, and convincing moral case for not having children. We identify concentration on possible future individuals who may or may not come to be as the main (...) culprit for the failure and suggest that the focus should be shifted to people who already exist. Pronatalism’s hegemonic status in contemporary societies imposes upon us a lifestyle that we have not chosen yet find almost impossible to abandon. We explicate the nature of this imposition and consider the implications of its exposure to different stakeholders with varying stands on the practice of antinatalism. Imposition as a term has figured in reproductive debates before, but the argument from postnatal, mental, and cultural imposition we launch is new. It is the hitherto overlooked and underdeveloped justification of antinatalism that should be solid and comprehensible enough to be used even by activists in support of their work. (shrink)

Is the tendency to morally prioritize humans over animals weaker in children than adults? In two pre-registered studies (N = 622), 5- to 9-year-old children and adults were presented with moral dilemmas pitting varying numbers of humans against varying numbers of either dogs or pigs and were asked who should be saved. In both studies, children had a weaker tendency to prioritize humans over animals than adults. They often chose to save multiple dogs over one human, and many valued the (...) life of a dog as much as the life of a human. While they valued pigs less, the majority still prioritized ten pigs over one human. By contrast, almost all adults chose to save one human over even one hundred dogs or pigs. Our findings suggest that the common view that humans are far more morally important than animals appears late in development and is likely socially acquired. (shrink)

Trois stratégies furent principalement adoptées par les philosophes pour résoudre le problème de la démarcation : 1° la recherche d’un critère de démarcation unique et anhistorique, 2° la recherche de listes à critères multiples, 3° la recherche d’une définition de la pseudoscience. En analysant la proposition de Sven Ove Hansson (2013), cet article est principalement focalisé sur la troisième stratégie. L’article poursuit un triple objectif : i) exposer chacun des critères qui composent la définition de la pseudoscience de Hansson (...) en 2013, et les difficultés que l’auteur tente de dépasser, ii) mettre en exergue les limites de cette définition, iii) dégager in fine des propositions permettant d’avancer sur la question de la pseudoscience. (shrink)

The concept of mutual responsiveness is currently based on little empirical data in the literature of Responsible Research and Innovation. This paper explores RRI’s idea of mutual responsiveness in the light of recent RRI case studies on private sector research and development. In RRI, responsible innovation is understood as a joint endeavour of innovators and societal stakeholders, who become mutually responsive to each other in defining the ‘right impacts’ of the innovation in society, and in steering the innovation towards realising (...) those impacts. Yet, the case studies identified several reasons for why the idea of mutual responsiveness does not always appear feasible or desirable in actual R&D situations. Inspired by the discrepancies between theory and practice, we suggest three further elaborations for the concept of responsiveness in RRI. Process-responsiveness is suggested for identifying situations that require stakeholder involvement specifically during R&D. Product-responsiveness is suggested for mobilising the potential of innovation products to be adaptable according to diverse stakeholder needs. Presponsiveness is suggested as responsiveness towards stakeholders that are not reachable at a given time of R&D. Our aim is to contribute to a more tangible understanding of responsiveness in RRI, and suggest directions for further analysis in upcoming RRI case studies. (shrink)